I resemble that remark.

The point is that they don’t; the influence goes the other direction. The government reward Ma Ba Tha for stirring up tensions when they believe it will be advantageous to them. Ma Ba Tha are on a leash. For instance. U Wirathu, the angry baby face monk, so called ‘face of Buddhist terror’ - was released from prison…

So I have only just started to appreciate Vivian Leigh after trying to come up with a couple’s Halloween costume to take advantage of my partner’s uncanny resemblance to young Brando.

I just wanted to point out again that Ma Ba Tha actually do not have any political control of the country - they are monks and they are barred from holding office. They may influence politicking by building anti-muslim sentiment that politicians know they can leverage, but its also likely that political figures have…

Yeah, sorry - as I was typing that I started sifting through my library’s map collection (~1400 - >) to see when exactly Yangon appears, but nothing legible/good post - 1750 which is when the king of Pegu named it (I think?). So what I’m saying is went down a research k-hole and it took a while to get out. Didn’t mean…

But... that’s how it’s spelled/said in the local language... Yangon, I mean, not Myanmar/Burma, which is a literary v. spoken thing that got twisted into a political/ethnic inclusivity thing despite both words meaning the same exact thing. Yangon though, the Burmese script (ရန်ကုန်) is pretty clearly: ya+ng (nasal…

The problem with a state-by-state approach is that we don’t border check state lines. Chicago’s problem with gun violence isn’t Chicago’s gun laws - its the lax gun laws in its surrounding, rural states:(

Airdrop, no - flinging, yes: http://lannaactionforburma.blogspot.co.uk/2007/10/panty-…

I’m going to sound really, really annoyingly picky about this - but I promise it’s because I’m just deep in doctorate land and not an actual asshole. Ma Ba Tha do not run the country and its not entirely correct to just call them a nationalist group. They are religio-nationalist, and arguably, a big part of the…

Different schools of Buddhism, though. Mahayana v. Theravada in Myanmar. There is a great book called “How Buddhism Acquired a Soul on the Way to China” that does a great job of mapping out some of the primary differences and how/why they emerged.

So also, in this context the ‘hpoun’ stuff that they are talking about here, the issues with women’s bodies being impure, doesn’t come from Buddhism per-se but actually has deep roots ‘indigenous’ religions that predate the spread of Buddhism into Myanmar. Granted, it doesn’t then help that many if not most Buddhists…

Myanmar women activists actually did something similar to the military regime - true story. The movement was called ‘Panty Power’ and at some point there was a plan to airdrop thousands of panties.

Actually, also Southern Thailand. In Sri Lanka Bodu Balu Sena also aligns with the state when it suits them.

There is a nifty tool here: https://www.opencongress.org/people/compare

I agree the differences matter, I’m just happy that in my mind, those difference are about varying approaches to ultimately shared moral values - which I don’t think is true of conservatives: http://www.moralfoundations.org . Foreign policy wise I totally agree her votes sucked in the Senate, but then I’ve lived most…

I don’t mean this to be at all confrontational, but I think its an important thing to keep mentioning - Hillary and Bernie voted together 92.5% of the time when they were in the Senate. By comparison, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie vote together 92% of the time. I understand people having preference for different…

It can be as bad as with Rand/Ron Paul supporters, which is unfortunate because its so unnecessary:( Mara Wilson retweeted this the other day, which hit the nail on the head for me:

Happy to see my childhood trauma continues to both upset and sadden people. A little image to go along with the story - not that its very frightening on its own but looking at it gives me shivers.

Bernie and Hillary voted together 92.5% of the time in the senate. By comparison, Bernie and Elizabeth Warren vote together 92% of the time. Notably differences are international affairs (Hillary more centrist) and gun control (Hillary left of Bernie). Her debate response to the question of her Iraq votes satisfied my…

Thank you! You are genuinely the first to appreciate it:)